Sorting machine for paper forms



Dec. 9, 1952 N. 1.. KUSTERS SORTING MACHINE FOR PAPER FORMS 3 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed July 11, 1949 IN VEN T02 0/6551??- Z. A/us rRs Dec. 9, 1952 N. KUSTERS SORTING MACHINE FOR PAPER FORMS 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed July 11 1949 xxxxxxxuxxnl IN vz-w Tok Wanner! Kusraes g i Dec. 9, 1952 N. L. KUSTERS 2,620,924

SORTING MACHINE FOR PAPER FORMS Filed July 11, 1949 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 4'9 28 52 4.9 811a 5 F a 5] 7/ A {g5 53 56 6.9

:3 Q boeeooooooooooee'oooo I0 Patented Dec. 9, 1952 UNITED STATES SORTING MACHINE FOR PAPER FORMS Norbert L. Kusters, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, as-

signor to The Honorary Advisory Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, a body corporate of Canada Application July 11, 1949, Serial No. 104,062

4 Claims. 1

This invention relates to amachine for high speed sorting of relatively thin flexible documents which have been identified by holes punched therein at certain index positions or stations. By relatively thin flexible documents is meant documents which are thin in relation to the cards for sorting machines known as Hollerith cards.

A simple and practical machine for sorting paper forms and the like, for example cheques, by mechanical means, must operate on the basis of distinguishing between the documents according to whether a mark is or is not provided at any particular index position or station. The marking may be a contrast in colour, such, for example, as a black mark on a white background, but a punched hole or perforation is more satisfactory because it ismore reliable on dirty cheques and because the sorting machine may be checked for mistakes by lining'up all the cheques coming out of the machine and looking through the common perforation. Most of the known sorting machines are designed to operate on cards marked or coded to represent numbers in the decimal system, but the binary system of numbering, in which there are only two symbols, and 1, has also been used.

Regardless of the system of coding followed, the known machines have been based on the combination of means for detecting a perforation or other mark at a certain station and separate mechanical cheque selecting means actuated by the detecting or sensing means. It is common, for example, to pass a card between two contact members so connected electrically that when'one of them, for example, a brush, encounters a perforation and makes contact with the other con.- tact member, a relay is operated to actuate selector means to so deal with the card as to de.- liver it to the desired bin. It has also been pro-,- posed to actuate selecting mechanism by compressed air blown through a hole in a roller and an aligned hole of a card. Not only are such machines complicated and expensive both to construct and to maintain however, but their speed of operation is limited by the fact that they detect or sense a, mark at a given index position in one step or operation, and select a cheque accordingly in a following separate operation.

Further limitations of the known machines are that they require a relatively stifi card which must not be creased and it is necessary in some instances to make sure that there are no electrically conductive impurities in the card.

The principal object of the present invention is the provision in a sorting machine of a 69mbined sensing and selector device adaptedboth to sense and select a cheque or the like in one step while the same is moving at high speed in constant rotary motion. 7

A further object of the invention is to provide a, combined sensing and selector device which is 2 capable of selecting relatively thin flexible forms and is not influenced in its operation by the fold* ing or creasing of the form or by impurities in the paper.

With these and other objects in view there is provided according to the invention a combined sensing and selector device for a sorting machine essentially of a roller having formed therein a. suction chamber in communication withsuction means adapted, when the chamber is connected to a source of suction, to hold a cheque in en.- gagement with the roller, a plurality of holes extending through the wall of the roller so as to admit air to the suction chamber and thereby render the suction means inoperative to hold the cheque when it is perforated at an index position aligned with an open hole, and valve means for closing or opening the hole as desired. When a document is not perforated at an open selector roller hole the suction means holds it and the roller carries it for a part of its revolution until suction is cut off by suitable valve means. If a document is perforated at an open selector roller hole, air enters the suction chamber and the suction means does not operate to hold the document.

It is a well known fact that a group of numbered cards can be sorted in numerical sequence by sorting for each digit in succession starting with the extreme right hand digit, each operation being carried out in all cards. Because there are only two symbols in the binary system of numbering a machine designed to operate'on cards coded according to the binary system is much simpler than a machine designed to operate on cards coded in the decimal system. Accordingly the invention will be described with reference to a preferred embodiment designed to operate on documents punched to represent digits in the binary system of numbering, and illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which the document is taken to be a cheque and in which:

Figure 1 is a perspective of a cheque sorting machine constructed in accordance with the invention, certain parts being removed to more clearly illustrate the construction,

Figure 2 is a representation of a cheque on which the machine is designed to operate,

Figure 3 is a sectional elevation on the line 3-4 of Figure 1,

Figure 4 is a detail view, partly in section, illustrating the device for picking up a form and feeding it to the selector roller,

Figure 5 is a sectional elevation of the machine taken on the line 5-5 of Figure 3 and illustrating the selector roller,

Figure 6 is a detail view of the selector roller in section,

Figure 7 is a section on the line l.? of Figure 6,

Figure 3 is an enlarged fragmentary view of the selector roller, partly in section,

Figure 9 is an enlarged detail view illustrating the locking slots in the locking plate for the individual valves, and

Figure 10 is an enlarged sectional view on the line |0-|0 of Figure 5.

Referring to Figures 1 and 3, a stack of cheques is arranged on a holder 2| and the stack is held up against a plate 22 by a weight device 23 in such position that the cheque which is held against the plate 22 is engaged by the suction mouths 24 of the feeder device 25 (Figure 4) and is carried thereby to a position to be engaged between the driven roller 26 (Figure 3) and spring pressed roller 21. The driven roller 26 advances the cheque as indicated by the arrows in Figure 3 so as to be engaged between the selector roller 28 and spring pressed roller 29.

If the cheque is punched at a given index position in a row of index positions, it is simply advanced, without following the periphery of the selector roller 28, so as to strike the top surface of the guide plate 30 which guides the cheque into the nip between the driven roller 3| and the spring pressed roller 32. The driven roller 3| then advances the cheque so that it drops into the bin A mounted in support 33. If, however, the cheque is not punched at a given position as set forth below, it is held by the selector roller for a portion of one revolution of the selector roller such that the cheque is lifted on to the guide plate 34 and is then engaged by the driven roller 35 and spring pressed roller 36. The cheque is then advanced under guide plate 42 to be engaged between driven roller 31 and spring pressed roller 38 whereby the cheque is passed to bin B mounted on support 39.

Referring to Figure 4, there is illustrated a suitable form of feeder device 25 which is adapted for high speed operation. The feeder device consists essentially of a hollow shaft 40 with suction heads 4| in which are formed the ports 24 communicating with the hollow shaft which is placed, through valve means, in communication with the suction cup 43 connected to a source of suction. The shaft 40 is eccentrically supported at each end in a mounting member 44 which in turn is mounted in one of the side plates 45 of the machine, these plates being best seen in Figure 1. The mounting member 44 at the end of the shaft 46 opposite the suction cup 43 is provided with a short shaft 46 adapted to be driven by suitable gearing as indicated in Figure 1. An internal ring gear 41 is fixedly mounted in each plate 45 and a pinion 48 mounted one at each end of the shaft 46 is adapted to rotate in a recess formed in the mounting plate 44. As shaft 46 is driven, the pinion 48, meshing with ring gear 41, is caused to roll around ring gear 41 and since the ring gear is twice the (pitch) diameter of the pinions 48, the position which the suction mouths 24 occupy at any point in the revolution of the shaft 40 is exactly the same as the position they occupy in the immediately preceding or any other revolution of the shaft 40. This means that once in each revolution of the mounting members 44 and of the shaft 40 the suction mouths are brought fiat up against the stack of cheques 20, so that a cheque is picked up and fed to the rollers 26 and 21, as set forth above, valve means being provided as indicated above to place the hollow shaft 40 and the suction cup in communication for that portion of a revolution of the shaft during which it is desired that the cheque be held by ports 24.

Referring to Figures 5-10, the combined sensing and selector roller 28, herein referred to as the selector roller; is mounted in the side plates 45 on bearing members 49 in which shaft 50 and hollow shaft 5| respectively are journalled. The roller is provided with a rubber sleeve 52 formed with a flat 53 as illustrated in Figures 5 and 7. A suction chamber 54 is formed in the roller in the area adjacent this flat 53 (see Figures 6 and 7) and a row of holes 55, preferably twenty in number, as well as two suction ports 56, extend through the rubber sleeve 52 and the wall of the roller 28 into the chamber 54. Each of the holes 55 is adapted to be closed off by a valve member 51 carrying a gasket 51A and mounted on a stem 58 adapted to slide in a bore 59 as illustrated in Figure '7. Each valve member is normally urged by a helical spring 60 to the position illustrated in Figure '7 in which the hole 55 is closed by the valve member 57. Secured to the base of the chamber 54 by screws 6| (Figure 6) is a locking plate 62 formed with a hole 63 corresponding to each of the holes 55 and aligned therewith to pass the stem 58 of a valve 51. A groove 64 is formed at each side of each hole 63 to pass the projecting ends of a pin 65 fixed in stem 58 and projecting from each side thereof at a level such that when the stem 58 is depressed against the action of the spring 60 to bring the pin 65 below plate 62, the valve member 51 is clear of the hole 55. To lock the valve member in that position it is turned by a screw driver or other key member inserted through the hole 55 to engage in a suitable recess in the top of the valve member so that the pin is arranged at an angle to the grooves 64. By this means any one or more of the valve members 51 may be held away from its co-operating hole 55, so as to admit air to the chamber 54.

Referring to Figures 5, 6 and 10, the hollow shaft 5| extends through end plate 45, in which it is supported in bearing 49, and through a bearing member 66 (Figures 5 and 10) rigidly mounted in plate 61. The bearing member 66 is formed with a bore 68 parallel to the hollow shaft 5|, which is connected by tube 69 to a suitable source of suction. A bore 10, extending radially of the bearing 66 and communicating with the bore 68, is then adapted to co-operate with a port (Figures 6 and 10) formed in the side of the hollow shaft 5| in line with the bore 10. As appears from Figure 10, suction is applied to the hollow shaft for that portion of its revolution during which a part of the port H is opposite the bore 10. Referring to Figure 6, hollow shaft 5| communicates with chamber 54 through bores 12 and 13 through restricted orifice 14, the purpose of which is indicated below. The hollow shaft is provided with a vacuum regulator comprising an adjustable member '15 having a pass'age adapted to be closed by spring pressed ball Referring to Figure 2, a cheque 20 is provided at a given distance from the top edge 11, identified for convenience by the cut corner 18, with holes 19 as desired at any one or more of the row of index positions marked with the letter X, the spacing of these positions corresponding exactly to that of the holes 55 in roller 28. If desired, each cheque 20 may be provided with holes in a row of index positions at the same distance from the bottom edge of the cheque, use of this second set being indicated below. The selector roller 28 is driven by a pinion 8| through gearing 82 synchronized with the gearing drivor more given positions. W there are only two symbols, O a'nd '1, in-the binary ing the feeder device 25 and that driving the driven roller 25, so that the feeder device feeds the cheque to the driven roller 26 and it passes the cheque to the nip between the selector roller '28 and the roller 29 with the stations indicated by the letter X (Figure 2) aligned, both lengthwise and circumferentially of the roller 28, with the holes 55.

If none of the holes 55 is open the suction ports 56 pull the cheque against the flat 53 and hold it until the suction roller has passed through an angle such that the bore and port 1| are no longer in communication, whereupon'the suction is cut off and the cheque is released topass to rollers 35 and 35 over guide 33. As illustrated in Figure 7, the flat 53 is not centred on theholes 55 and ports 56. The holes 55 and ports 56 are close to the edge of the flat 53, so that the cheque will be engaged by the flat 53 close to the edge 77.

If some or all of the ports 55 are open but there are no perforations in the cheque, 'it will be carried to rollers 35 and 36, as when a cheque with perforations is passed through the machine but none of the holes 55 is open. If one of the holes 55 is open, any cheque which does not-have a perforation at the corresponding index position will likewise be passed through rollers-i5 and 36 into bin B, but if a cheque has a perforation at that position, air entering the chamber 54 throughthe open hole prevents'a vacuum building up in the chamber sufiicient for the ports 56 to hold the cheque. It, therefore, passes downto rollers SI and 32 over guide 35 and drops into bin -A.

As indicated above, a restricted passage or bore it connects the hollow shaft 5| tothe bore 72. This restricted passage must be of a s'izein relation to the holes 55, and the adjustments of the vacuum regulator must be'such tha'tair entering through one'hole'55 will effectively prevent a vacuum being built up in chamber-54 su'fiicient to enable ports '55 to hold acheque.

It will be seen from the-above that-the valve members 5'! may be so adjusted as to-pass to bin A all the cheques having a perforation at any one As mentioned above,

system of numbering and eitherof these may correspond either toa perforation or the absence of a perforation. 'In the binary'system of numbering multiplication of a number by two is effected by adding a zero,'and numbers which are not derived in this way by multiplication are obtained by adding 1 to the preceding number. Thus numbers are converted from the decimal system to the binary system as indicated inthe following table:

Table I Decimal Number Binary Number Thus up to eight cheques can be identified by three index positions in the binary system and up to sixteen cheques by four positions, each position representing a digit in the binary system of numbering and that position being punched or not punched, as may be seen from the above table. Thus, proceeding from .right to left, if 1 represents a perforation and 0 represents the ab sence of a perforation, cheque No. 9 would be punched at positions 1 and 4, cheque No.10 at positions 2 and 4, cheque No. 11 at positions 1, '2 and 4, and so on.

It follows that the minimum number of index positions required to number a group of N cheques is equal to n, where N and nare related as follows:

Thus the-number of index positions required :for a given number of cheques is indicated by the following table:

Table H Number of possible Number of cheques punching positions required Operation of machine The manner in which cheques may be sorted with the machine described, the cheques being punched as indicated, may now be described. If we assume that there are fifteen cheques, and that 1 represents a perforation and 0 the absence of a perforation, the markings on the cheque will be as in Table I. The first step is to adjust the machine to sort for the first digit of the binary system of numbering, this being the digit at the right hand side in TableI. If it be assumed that the stack of cheques is in the following arbitrary sequence:

the following separation occurs, the sequence of the cheques in each bin beingas set forth.

(a) Cheques having a perforation in thefirst index position and therefore passing to bin A:

(b) Cheques not having a perforation in the first index position and therefore being carried. to bin B:

The cheques from bin A are now placed on top of the cheques from bin B and the new stack is passed through the machine after closing the hole 55 in the first index position and opening thehole in the second index. position. The-separation is then as follows:

(a) Cheques having a perforation in the second index positionand therefore passing to bin 'A:

1-l5-3--| l-2--lE--5-,M

(b) Cheques not having a perforation inthe second index position and thereforebeing carried to bin B:

The same procedure is repeated, the hole 55 in the second position being closed and that in the third position being opened to sort for the third digit and the separation is as follows:

(a) Cheques having a perforation in the third index position and therefore passing to bin A:

(b) Cheques not having a perforation in the third index position and therefore being carried to bin B:

The sorting is then carried out for the fourth digit, closing the hole in the third position and opening the hole in the fourth position, with the following result:

(a) Cheques having a perforation in the fourth index position and therefore passing to bin A:

(b) Cheques not having a perforation in the fourth index position and therefore being carried to bin B:

With twenty index positions up to a million cheques may be handled as seen from Table II above and in twenty passes through the machine a million cheques may be sorted out so that they are all in the proper sequence. In such a sorting only one selector hole is open at a time and the machine operates only on the row of index positions at the leading edge of the cheque identified by the corner 18, the trailing edge row being used, in this case, only for checking purposes.

In addition to so sorting a group of cheques or other documents so that they will be placed in the proper sequence, the machine is capable of selecting one single cheque and in fact carries out this complicated operation in two passes of the cheques through the machine. In this case more than one selector valve is open at a time and the row of index positions at the trailing edges of the cheque is used as follows: The first step is to ascertain from a table such as Table I in what positions the cheque to be selected will be perforated by reason of its number. The selector valves are then closed in those stations and all other valves are opened. When, in the operation described above, one selector valve is open, both of the bins A and B will receive the same number of cheques, but when more than one selector valve is open, more cheques will pass to bin A than to bin B. All of the cheques which are carried by the selector roller on to the guide 34 so as to pass to bin B have in common the fact that they are not punched at any of the open selector valve positions, and the number of such cheques is equal to 2 where n is the number of closed selector valves. It follows that in the first pass through the machine the number of -cheques carried by the selector roller on to the guide 34 and passed to bin B depends on the number of perforations in the cheque to be selected and therefore the number of cheques to be examined in the second pass to find the cheque to be selected will be small if the number of perforations is small. The perforations in the row of positions at the trailing edge of the cheque do not correspond to the perforations in the row of positions at the leading edge 11, but instead a position which is perforated in one edge is not perforated in the other and vice versa. If,

therefore, the number of perforations in the row of positions in the leading edge is large, the number in the other row will be small accordingly, and therefore the stack of cheques 20 is inverted in the holder 2| so that the trailing edge will be at the top and the row of positions at the trailing edge will be sensed.

The cheques which are then passed to the bin B in the first operation or pass may then be very few in number and if desired the cheque to be selected can readily be found without the use of the machine. The machine may, however, be used as follows: The cheques from bin B are placed in the holder 2| with that edge up which was down in the first pass or operation, so that the row of index positions will be sensed which was not sensed in the first operation. The selector valves T"! which were open for the first operation are then closed for the second operation and the selector valves which were closed for the first operation or pass are opened. The cheques which in the first operation have been passed to the bin B are perforated only at the perforated index positions of the cheque to be selected, and only this cheque to be selected is perforated in all of these positions, the other cheques being punched in only some of these positions. The cheque to be selected is therefore the only one which has no perforations at these positions in the row of positions at the other edge of the cheque and these positions are the ones in which the selector valves are open for the second operation. Consequently the cheque to be selected is the only one which in the second operation will be carried on to the guide 34 by the selector roller 28 and passed to the bin B.

Since the machine according to the invention operates by suction rather than by electrical means it does not incorporate electrical relays, contacts or brushes which may become fouled with dust and dirt and thus rendered inoperative, and it is not necessary that the document dealt with be a relatively stiff card. The document should, in fact, be sufficiently thin and flexible that it may be drawn against the flat 53 by the suction at the ports 56 and will readily bend about the periphery of the roller without pulling the document away from the fiat 53. The usual bank cheque paper is entirely suitable and it may be embossed without interferring with the operation of the machine.

What I claim as my invention is:

l. A machine for high-speed sorting of relatively thin flexible documents according to the presence or absence of a perforation therein at a given index position in a row of index positions, comprising a frame, a combined sensing and selector roller journalled therein and adapted in one step both to sense and select a document, means for rotating the roller at a substantially constant rate, a suction chamber in said roller adapted to be connected to a source of suction during a given portion of each revolution of the roller, at least one suction port at the surface of the roller in communication with said chamber adapted, while suction is maintained thereat, to hold a document in engagement with the roller, a row of holes spaced longitudinally of the roller, each corresponding to an index position of a document, valve means in connection with each hole adjustable either to close the hole or to place it in communication with the suction chamber to render said suction means inoperative to hold a document when it is perforated at the corresponding index position, means synchronized with said means rotating the roller for feeding a document to the roller during rotation thereof with the index positions of the document aligned with the roller holes both lengthwise and circumferentially of the roller, and means adapted to press the document into contact with the roller.

2. A machine for high-speed sorting of documents as defined in claim 1 in which the said roller comprises a rubber sleeve formed with a fiat in which the suction ports and holes are formed.

3. A machine for high-speed sorting of documents as defined in claim 2 in which the suction ports and holes are formed close to the leading edge of the fiat.

4. A machine for high-speed sorting of relatively thin flexible documents according to the presence or absence of a perforation therein at a given index position in a row of index positions, comprising a combined sensing and selector roller adapted in one step both to sense and select a document, said roller having spaced longitudinally thereof a row of holes each corresponding to an index position of a document, means for causing the roller to rotate at a sub- 10 stantially constant rate, means for feeding a document to the roller during rotation thereof with the index positions thereof aligned with the roller holes both lengthwise and circumferentially of the roller, means adapted to press the document into contact with the roller, at least one suction port at the surface of the roller adapted when suction is applied thereto to hold a document in engagement with the roller, means placing the suction port in communication with a source of suction during a given portion of each revo1u tion of the roller, and means at each roller hole adjustable to render said suction port inoperative to hold a document when it is perforated at the corresponding index position.

NORBERT L. KUSTERS.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS 

